


Taken in Hand

by the_dragongirl



Series: Hand to Heart [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Rebels, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/F, F/M, M/M, Multi, OT3, Polyamory, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Threesome - F/F/M, swpolyamoryweek
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-19
Updated: 2016-04-19
Packaged: 2018-06-03 04:59:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6597700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_dragongirl/pseuds/the_dragongirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It never occurred to Hera that there might be more than one match for her soul mark. Luckily, Numa is far more observant.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Taken in Hand

It honestly hadn’t even occurred to Hera to check. After all, she already knew her soulmate. They had been among the lucky ones, who never had to search for each other. One of Hera’s earliest memories was, in fact, of pressing her palm against Numa’s, and laughing at how it tingled when the matching marks on their palms lined up. She hadn’t really known what it meant until years later, when Hera had been staying over for dinner, and Numa had had asked her nerras why their faces got all funny when they held hands without their gloves. Her nerra Boil had nearly choked on his tea, and her nerra Waxer had been forced to explain the concept while blushing furiously and patting his husband on the back in an attempt to get him breathing again. But Hera has always known the Numa was hers, and she was Numa’s. Having the word for it didn’t really change things much.

And so, when Hera found herself strangely drawn to the new partner she picked up on Gorse, she had dismissed it. It was a natural enough reaction, after all. Kanan was an extremely attractive man, and ridiculously charming to boot, and, well, this mission had taken her away from Numa for an awfully long time. And it was obvious that he found her attractive as well. Honestly, if they hadn’t been so busy with the never-ending stream of missions from Fulcrum, she might have considered inviting him to her bed as a friend. But as far as Hera was concerned, their duty would always come first, and she couldn’t afford to be distracted just for the sake of a little sexual gratification. She had a soulmate. Kanan knew and respected that, and seemed content to just be her friend. That would have to be enough.

The more time she spent with him, though, the stronger the attraction grew. It turned out that, beneath that rough exterior, there was a gentleness and a nobility to Kanan that he seemed largely unaware of himself. He might pretend at being an uncaring, jaded roughneck, but there was a kindness and a compassion to him that all the grime in the galaxy couldn’t hide entirely. She still couldn’t get him to look at the larger picture, but when it came to individual people in need of their help...gods of her ancestors, he was inspiring. She sometimes wondered, very privately, if that was something he had learned from the Jedi, or if it was just something uniquely Kanan.

She also found herself fantasizing about what his hands must be like beneath his gloves, imagining what his mark would look like against his bronzed skin, and that...that was NOT something a woman with soulmate should be doing. Numa wouldn’t mind if Hera had a casual fling, but bare hands were for your lover, not just your bed partner. The soulmarks were private. SACRED. Not something to be shared out of mere prurient curiosity. And so, Hera carefully kept her distance, pushed back all those half-formed daydreams, and counted the days until their rendezvous with Numa.

* * *

 

Of course, once Numa finally DID return from her own mission, it took her all of ten minutes in Kanan’s company to figure out what was going on. She had spent the first minute of that kissing Hera soundly, vigorously shaking Kanan’s gloved hand, and thanking him for keeping her wife in once piece. As Hera introduced them and began to debrief Numa on the missions they’d completed in her absence, though, Numa’s eyes narrowed. She seemed to be only half listening to Hera’s report, focussing instead on looking back and forth between Hera and Kanan, her expression increasingly thoughtful. Finally, she interrupted Hera with a quick gesture, and turned to peer intently at Kanan.

“Right,” Numa said. “You there. Kanan. Right or left?”

Kanan stared at her, bafflement plain on his face. “I ...uh...what?”

“It’s a simple enough question,” she said. “Your mark. Is it on the right or the left?”

“Numa!” Hera hissed. “Holy gods! You can’t...you can’t just ASK someone that. What is wrong with you?”

Numa made a soft noise of disgust in the back of her throat. “Honestly, my love, are you really telling me that you haven’t noticed? But never mind. It obviously the left.” Then she strode over to where Kanan was frozen in shock and, without hesitation, grabbed his left hand and yanked off his glove.

“Oh hells, Numa!” Hera shouted, and rushed over them. “Kanan, I am so sorry! I have no idea what’s come over her, and I can’t believe she…” And then she saw his hand, and broke off in mid sentence.

There, plainly visible at the base of his palm, was an intimately familiar mark. It looked strangely small on his larger hand, but the shape of it was unmistakable. She had, after all seen it so many times before on her own hand, and on Numa’s.

“Oh…” she breathed, forgetting her tirade completely.

Numa laughed, soft and warm and bright. “It seems, my love, that you have found more than just a partner in the work for us. Now, since he and I have only just met, I think you should be the one to do the honors first, yes?”

“The...the what?” Hera asked dazedly, eyes shifting from Kanan’s hand to his face and back again. Kanan, for his part, seemed equally unable to react, simply standing there with his hand held out in front of him, eyes filled with a strange mixture of confusion and hope.

Numa laughed again, low and fond. “His hand, my love. You need to take his hand. Show him what this means.”

Kanan gasps softly at that, and Hera looked up into his eyes, trying to gauge his expression.

“Is..is this alright?” she asked quietly. Because the marks matched, which had to mean that he...that they….but still. It had to be his choice. She couldn’t force this on him, just because the unknown gods had marked them for each other.

He swallowed visibly and, with a mute nod, reached towards her. Trembling, she pulled off her own left glove, and fitted her palm against his, their marks just brushing. A familiar warm tingling sensation raced up her arm, and then...oh. OH. Oh sweet gods of her ancestors, how had she not known that a part of them was still missing? Doing this with Numa had always felt like coming home, but now, with Kanan here, with BOTH of them, it was...more. So very much more.

Numa let out a soft, delighted sigh at the tremor that ran through them both. “Well, my love,” she said, wrapping arm around Hera’s shoulder, careful not to dislodge her hand from Kanan’s. “It seems that you and I have been gifted not once, but twice.” She grinned up at Kanan. “Now, you and I can have our turn in a bit, I think, but first, it would probably be best if we continued this somewhere more private, don’t you agree? After all, we have a great deal to... discuss ”

“Right,” Kanan said faintly. “Private. Private sounds good.”

Hera couldn’t help but agree.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Taken in Hand [Podfic]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9090034) by [the_dragongirl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_dragongirl/pseuds/the_dragongirl)




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